Photography 1: The Art of Photography

Project: Photographing Movement.
Exercise Panning With Different Shutter Speeds.

With the help of my subject and a plain background I took a number of photographs at different shutter speeds from 1/10 second to 1/1000 of a second.  The camera was panned on the tripod, keeping the subject in the middle of the frame.  The aperture was adjusted with each change in shutter speed to ensure the correct exposure.

I asked my subject to walk backwards and forwards at a steady speed in front of the camera.  I adjusted the shutter speed after each pass.

The photographs taken are shown below:

7070 Shutter speed: 1/10 second

The background of this photograph is streaked and blurred.  The subject is mostly sharp.  The legs are blurred as they were moving faster than the panning camera.  There is a good sense of movement.

7071 Shutter speed: 1/30 second

The background of the photograph is blurred but not as much as with the shutter speed of 1/10 second.  The subject is mostly sharp.  There is a reasonable sense of movement.

7072 Shutter speed: 1/60 second

Due to the relatively slow pace of walking of the subject, even though the camera is panned most of the photograph is sharp.  Some motion blur is present on the moving leg, which is moving in the opposite direction to the panning camera.  There is not much sense of movement in the photograph.

7073 Shutter speed: 1/100 second

Again due to the subject's relatively slow pace of walking all is sharp in the photograph.  There is no real sense of movement.  This photograph is the first where both the subject and background are sharp with no particular sense of movement.  The following photos were all taken at faster shutter speeds, so the subject and background are sharp in each one.

7074 Shutter speed: 1/125 second

7075 Shutter speed: 1/200 second

7076 Shutter speed: 1/250 second

7077 Shutter speed: 1/400 second

7078 Shutter speed: 1/640 second

7079 Shutter speed: 1/1000 second

Looking at all of the images from both exercises in this project my favourites are given below:

Exercise 1: Image 7060 (1/10 second).  In this photograph there is a good sense of movement.  The subject is still reasonably recognisable.

Exercise 2: Image 7070 (1/10 second).  In this photograph the subject is mostly sharp, except for the faster moving legs.  The background is nicely blurred giving a feeling of movement.

What have I learned from this exercise ?

Panning the camera with the shutter speed set at 1/60 sec or 1/30 sec will give a fairly sharp image of the subject while the background will be streaked.  1/10 sec is better for a relatively slow walking subject.